Following rumors of the Lumia 650, Microsoft acknowledged its existence last month when the company’s Chief Marketing Officer, Chris Capossela, discussed the upcoming smartphone with Paul Thurrott and Mary Jo Foley at a Windows Weekly show. It also came to light during the discussion that at some point Microsoft’s smartphone ambitions could be edging away from the Lumia brand and transitioning to what will become the Surface Phone.

The Lumia 650, whose specs and design have now been confirmed thanks to VentureBeat, may well be one of the last Lumia phones we’ll see. Codenamed Saana or Sansa, the Lumia 650 isn’t all that prepossessing and not much of an improvement on its predecessor the Lumia 640. Many of the features are the same, such as the same quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon processor, Dual Sim, 5-inch 720 x 1280 LCD screen, 2000 mAh battery, 1 GB of RAM, 8 GB internal Storage, 8-megapixel rear camera and 5-megapixel front camera.

Perhaps the most impressive upgrade is the fact the 650 has wireless charging capabilities. This is hardly really a game changer, but maybe as the handset is at least more aesthetically pleasing — it’s sleek and has an impressive metal trim — to the eye, Microsoft is content with that.

Given the somewhat embattled life of Lumia under Microsoft, one feels that Redmond has to reinvent the smartphone, and given that the Surface brand is seen in a far more favorable light than Lumia, it’s highly likely that we’ll soon see the latter being subsumed by the former. For now, at least, what could be one of the last of the Lumias in the 650 should become available sometime in the first quarter of this year.

Photo credit: EvaLeaks